McCoy's father, also named Mark, is a Loxahatchee beekeeper. The queen bee in one of his hives is in the lower left, and can be distinguished from the worker bees by her larger body and less-pronounced stripes

The bee crisis

Audio:WPB beekeeper focuses on raising queens  The varroa mite has killed or severely weakened an estimated 40 percent to 60 percent of honeybees in the United States during the past six months.

 Millions of acres of U.S. fruit, nut, vegetable, seed and legume crops depend on insect pollination. An estimated 80 percent of insect crop pollination is accomplished by honeybees.

 Crops that require bees for pollination include apples, avocados, blueberries, cherries, cranberries, oranges, grapefruit, sunflowers, tangerines and watermelon. In addition, the production of most beef and dairy products depends on alfalfa, clover and other plants that require pollination.

 Honeybees are ideal for pollination because they can be managed easily and moved to where they are needed. They also will pollinate a wide variety of crops without harming the plants.

Sources: American Beekeeping Federation, U.S. Department of Agriculture

"If honeybees ceased to exist, two-thirds of the citrus, all of the watermelons, the blueberries, strawberries, pecans and beans would disappear," said Jerry Hayes, apiary inspection chief with the state's Division of Plant Industry.

But now it's the bee itself that is disappearing.

Under attack from a Southeast Asian parasite, vast numbers of the creatures are dying off, worried industry experts say. More than 50 percent of the bees in California, critical to the success of the Golden State's almond crop, have died during the past six months. Frantic growers there have sent out the call around the world, including Florida, for hives.

Not only California is suffering the ravages of the determined pest. As many as 40 percent to 60 percent of the bees nationwide have perished during the same six-month period, experts say.

"It's the biggest crisis that has ever faced the U.S. beekeeping industry," said Laurence Cutts of Chipley, president of the Florida State Beekeepers Association and a retired apiary inspector with the state Department of Agriculture.

Cutts lost two-thirds of his beehives to the predator, an eight-legged animal no bigger than a grain of salt that attaches itself to a bee and slowly sucks out its internal fluids.

The pest is the varroa mite, which has been in the United States since 1986, when it first showed up in Florida. But the pace of devastation has increased only during the past year. An entire hive can be wiped out within less than a year as the parasites, colloquially known as "vampire mites," lodge in a hive and begin to reproduce.

"The varroa mites have become resistant to the chemicals we use to kill them," said Loxahatchee beekeeper Mark McCoy.

McCoy is one of hundreds of beekeepers from around the country and as far away as Australia who responded to California's need for an additional 400,000 hives. He packed up more than 1,500 hives, housing 30 million-plus bees, last month and shipped them west on two flatbed semis.

"The bees are the only tool we have to pollinate the trees," said Colleen Aguiar, a spokeswoman for the California Almond Board, based in Modesto.

The state grows about 80 percent of the global almond crop, which is some 1 billion pounds of nuts a year. It takes 1.2 million hives to pollinate those groves, Aguiar said.

And almonds are only the beginning of the crisis. Apple growers in Virginia normally call on their own state's beekeepers for pollination help, but not this year, said Troy Fore, executive director of the 1,200-member American Beekeeping Federation Inc., based in Jesup, Ga.

"Now those apple growers have also turned to Florida beekeepers to provide pollination because they have lost bees in Virginia to the mite," Fore said.

But Florida itself needs its bees, and some industry observers suggest it might already have given away too many.

"I really think you will see a crunch here in Florida in a couple of months," said David Hackenberg, who operates hives in Dade City and Lewisburg, Pa. "A lot of guys have lost a lot of bees. The watermelon guys are just starting and they are already scrambling for bees."

Hackenberg and others in the business said the state's largest beekeeper, Horace Bell of DeLand, sold his more than 40,000 hives to companies in California this year and went out of business. That automatically reduces Florida's 200,000 bee colonies by 20 percent.

A spokeswoman at Bell's office said she could not confirm that Bell had left the business, but did say he was "semi-retired." Bell did not return phone calls seeking comment.

The honeybee emergency has not gone unnoticed in the scientific community.

Hundreds of researchers across the globe are looking for a solution, either through new treatments or by breeding mite-resistant bees. So far, the search hasn't yielded much success, said Jay Evans, a geneticist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Bee Research Lab in Beltsville, Md.

"Beekeepers need something this year or next to keep their colonies going," Evans said. "For the longer-term focus, we need to understand how the mites are so successful as parasites and breed bees that have a defense against them."

The loss of bee hives during the past year has been so catastrophic, Evans said, that researchers are questioning whether factors other than the varroa mite are at work.

Officials are scrambling for money to get to the heart of the problem.

The state Agriculture Department is seeking $300,000 from the legislature for bee research. As of Thursday, the request was heading for a conference committee, said Carolee Howe, assistant director of agriculture policy at the Florida Farm Bureau in Gainesville.

The American Bee Federation has asked the federal government for help. The group wants the USDA to spend $16 million a year, twice what it now allocates, on bee research.

Howe said the mite problem is getting worse.

"These mites are getting stronger," she said. "One day you will have a healthy hive. The next day your hives can be dead."

Those who work in the bee industry feel that the crops that don't need bees sometimes get more attention than they do. It's also admittedly difficult to evoke a passion for bees in the public mind, which often views them only as a stinging nuisance.

"We have this wonderful insect that can do marvelous things. It's not warm and fuzzy," said Hayes, the state apiary inspection chief. "It's not like a manatee. You can't cuddle and pet it.

"Yet without it, we have a negative impact on how our society eats. Maybe we can help people not love the bee, but at least appreciate it more."

This thing is already causing problems up here in Alaska. My wife buys her bees from the lower 48 and the prices are way up this year and there is fear of infestation from these little parasites. Fireweed honey may be going for a premium after the summer.

This mite almost killed out honey bees about 10 years ago. I remember as a kid seeing bees all over the place buzzing around clover blossoms. You took a risk walking through grass barefooted. Then this mite came along and for several years I saw NO honey bees at all. NONE. Not the first one. Just in the past 2 years have I started seeing honey bees again.

I have actually done quite a bit of work with bees in the last few years and this whole scare seems more like a political tactic by the beekeepers. Honeybees are not native and have effectively replaced the niche of many other native bee species. Honeybees are not the only pollinators of such crops.

I have actually done quite a bit of work with bees in the last few years and this whole scare seems more like a political tactic by the beekeepers. Honeybees are not native and have effectively replaced the niche of many other native bee species. Honeybees are not the only pollinators of such crops.

In some areas you may be correct. The problem is in the north where the flowering season is pushed unnaturally early using row covers and transplanting. Native pollinating insect populations don't have time to expand enough to be adequate for commercial sized fields. Which brings us to the other problem of large mono culture growing practices where there is a great need for pollinators for a very short time and then a shortage of flowers to sustain large pollinator populations. Honey bees are still by far the best solution to these problems. Besides, most of these crops are not native either.

I have bad news for you... the "killer" or africanized bees are already in the southern states.

What is bad news is that if they can't get this parasite under control or wiped out their may bee no bee's left in the states. That would be catastrophic to ALL of us. If you think its expensive to live now.... If the bees die then your going to see prices for Fresh fruits and veggies quadruple.

17
posted on 03/28/2005 10:02:12 AM PST
by SouthernBoyupNorth
("For my wings are made of Tungsten, my flesh of glass and steel..........")

this whole scare seems more like a political tactic by the beekeePlaces like the California Central Valley (where the almonds and most of Californias other crops are grown) no longer have functioning native bee populations. Long ago, when the valley was crisscrossed by riparian forests along the riverbanks, the valley sustained a natural bee population, but those forests were cut down long ago and those bees are practically extinct.

Our choices are: 1) Pull tens of thousands of acres of farmland out of production and turn it back into forest so the native bee populations can re-emerge (in a few decades...maybe). 2) Import bees.

Some bee strains are better able to deal with Varroa. I've heard that Russian bees and SMR bees are at least somewhat resistant. I've got Italian bees myself, and not totally sure of the cause, but lost my hive this winter. Many bee keepers use a bottom screen rather than a board at the base of the hive so that falling live varroa can't climb back into the hive. You then find a pile of dead Varroa underneath the hive.

AMES, Iowa -- Many college students become involved in research projects after they arrive on campus. Carol Fassbinder brought hers with her.

Fassbinder, an 18-year-old freshman at Iowa State University, is majoring in zoology and is conducting research on honey bees in the entomology department as part of her honors mentoring program.

Her interest in honey bees comes naturally. Her family owns and operates Fassbinder Apiaries in Elgin, Iowa. Her father, Robert, has been a professional beekeeper for 25 years.

Fassbinder has been researching various problems related to her family's bee colonies since she was in seventh grade. She has focused on finding new ways to control mites that infect honey bee colonies. The mites pose a serious threat to honey production and pollination success throughout the country. The mites have become resistant to the main chemical control available, so Fassbinder is looking for natural compounds that can control mites.

That was how her connection to ISU started. When Fassbinder was a high school junior, she contacted Joel Coats, entomology professor, for advice on a science fair project. He helped her identify natural compounds to test. Coats has been working with her ever since.

Fassbinder, Coats and an ISU graduate student, have a patent pending on a promising compound from lavender and the perilla plant, both members of the mint family. "One company is interested and it is doing its own on the compound," Fassbinder says.

Fassbinder has presented her research results in several national and international science fairs, including ones in Washington D.C., London and Japan. She will compete in a worldwide competition in Hanover, Germany, in October.

"The competitions have taught me that you don't have to be a genius to succeed," Fassbinder says. "The judges are more interested in how your mind works and how you solve problems."

Fassbinder doesn't spend all her time on her research. In addition to a full class schedule, she is also active in the Agriculture Council, Entomology Club, President's Leadership Class and the Freshman Honors Program.

"Carol's enthusiasm and drive are amazing to me," says Coats, who now heads the entomology department. "She is a complete person -- a team player and an intelligent person. That is a fantastic combination."

Fassbinder isn't resting on her laurels. She's busy testing new compounds using four honey bee colonies her father donated to the ISU entomology department.

"My research has helped me learn some lessons in life," Fassbinder says. "Things don't always work out they way we think they should. I've done months of work that have amounted to no results, but I have learned to be stubborn and push on."

Fassbinder also feels a responsibility to the industry she grew up around. She gives annual updates on her research to the state beekeeping associations in Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

"Many beekeepers are giving up because mites are destroying their colonies," says Fassbinder. "I feel a duty to them, to the industry and to my parents to find a control."

Maybe this mite will wipe out all the bees including the Killer Bees....and if we safeguard the Good Bees for a few years,....then we can reintroduce them and .....how about that for a plan?

These mites (there are 2 mite species involved here) probably kill every last colony they just make beekeeping more difficult. Also there are very few areas of the world where the mites aren't already established in the local bee populations.

In some of my research I found that native bees are pretty resilient. In agricultural settings, honeybees effectively replace native bees. However, once the land is returned to a somewhat (usually severly degraded)natural conditions, native bee populations returned within 5 years. Granted you do lose some diversity but overall they rebound rather nicely. My work was with bees in the midwest so it may be a bit different. Aside from a few specialized pollinators, most bees do not reside in forested areas. That said, forest isn't really native in the area we did our work. Forests were the result of mass fire supression and altered hydrology.

My wife and I keep bees and the articles on bee boards & newsletters seem to suggest that the more aggressive species (i.e., Africanized Honey Bees) survive better than gentler species like Italians. On the other hand, this problem has been around for a long time and, while the mites are getting resistant to Apistan - the chemical that kills them - there's lots of things a beekeeper can do nonchemically that controls the mites.

Aside from a few specialized pollinators, most bees do not reside in forested areas

That's the other issue. California has over 1000 native species of bees and wasps, but most of them are special pollinators. Since most of this land was seasonal marshlands and desert before irrigation and modern farming transformed it, most of the species here are very specialized (many only pollinate a single type of plant). An environment with temperatures that stay from the high 90's to the low 100's from early July to September (with zero rainfall) typically has few year-round flowering plants and is very unkind to nonspecialized bees.

Before the importation of bees, most of the Central Valley was covered in wheat because it was one of the few things that could be reliably grown here. Since then, the valley has almost completely been given over to pollinated plants. An elimination of imported honey bees would be an economic and social disaster for our area, and would seriously affect food prices across the entire country.

Maybe not but honey bees may be the only ones commercially available. When farmers plant crops that need insect intervention they call a beekeeper and he brings them the hives and places them around the fields as needed.

We have grown watermelons and pumpkins w/o bees and we have a crop but with them the yield grows quite a bit.

38
posted on 03/28/2005 10:50:38 AM PST
by tiki
(Won one against the Flipper)

Since most of this land was seasonal marshlands and desert before irrigation and modern farming transformed it, most of the species here are very specialized (many only pollinate a single type of plant).

California plants are often toxic to species not accustomed to them (IIRC, about 700 California native plant species are toxic to humans). The native bees I've seen here are very docile, black, and without stripes.

39
posted on 03/28/2005 10:50:51 AM PST
by Carry_Okie
(The environment is too complex and too important to be managed by central planning.)

We found 308 species of bees in our study area including 2 possible new species (they are currently being veryfied by the bee expert. Sites with honeybees had significantly lower diversity than sites without honeybees. I'm sure you are correct about the importance of the honeybee, I've just had some run ins with beekeepers that weren't too happy about some of the inferences of my work. Could have many implications regarding property rights considering the proximatey of some hives to state and federally owned natural areas.

that reminds me of a HS science experiment in which we looked at what types of pop the bees (well mostly yellow jackets)preferred. Nothign worked as well as organge soda. But orange soda in blue can wasn't as effective as organge soda in an orange can.

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